Curriculum Information

Whole School Curriculum Map 2016-2017

The Early Years Foundation Stage is a time of great change for both children and their parents. The foundation for future school life is achieved through fostering key learning skills in every child such as curiosity, confidence to explore & resilience; enabling every child to establish positive relationships with peers and adults and crucially to provide a safe and secure environment where the relationships between every child, their teacher, other adults and parents are strong.

From September 2012 we will be following the new Statutory Framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage. There are seven areas of learning and development in the Foundation Stage curriculum that are equally important and are inter-connected. Three ‘Prime’ areas are particularly important for fostering children’s curiosity and enthusiasm for learning, and for building their capacity to learn and form relationships. These prime areas begin to develop quickly in response to relationships and experiences, and run through and support learning in all other areas.

The Prime areas are;

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

Communication and Language

Physical Development

Four ‘Specific’ areas include essential skills and knowledge. They grow out of the prime areas, and provide important contexts for learning.

The Specific areas are;

Literacy

Mathematics

Understanding the World

Expressive Arts and Design

Each area of learning and development is implemented through purposeful play and a mix of adult-led and child-initiated activity. Play is essential for children’s development, building their confidence as they learn to explore, to think about problems, and relate to others. Children learn by leading their own play, and by taking part in play which is guided by adults. They have opportunities to learn indoors and outdoors and learning is carefully planned around their own interests; including exploration of the school grounds, walks and local area trips, visitors from outside of school and much more. Children in the Foundation Stage also have access to Modern Foreign Languages and Religious Education through planned topic work.

Supporting Learning at home and further information for parents & carers

Parents and/or carers can access more information via the following links:

Mathematical Understanding

Primary Mathematics is split in to several main categories – these include using and applying maths, counting and understanding number, calculating, shape, measures and handling data. These areas are covered and built upon year after year.

Where possible, all class teachers aim to link maths to different areas of the curriculum, and the class’ current theme. For example, Year 3/4 recently did a Design technology project which involved making pop-up monster story books. The children’s measuring skills were especially important during this unit of work.

The school has recently moved on to a new method of assessing maths, called assertive mentoring. This involves the children taking part in weekly skills tests, which aims to build up their confidence and ability in number and calculation. KS2 children are then split in to sets (according to their mathematics level) on a Friday, where they are taught specific skills relating to their weekly tests and ability level.

Mrs Chapman and Miss Dunton are undertaking a Maths Specialist Teacher programme with Nottingham Trent University, and are about to embark on a school project that is deigned to focus on an area of maths that children find challenging. Their area of focus is likely to be division and times table skills. This project will involve fun and innovative ways for the children to improve their maths skills.

Understanding Physical Development, Health & Wellbeing

Physical education develops the children’s knowledge, skills and understanding, so that they can perform with increasing competence and confidence in a range of physical activities. These include dance, games, gymnastics, swimming and water safety, athletics and outdoor adventure activities.

Physical education promotes an understanding in children of their bodies in action. It involves thinking, selecting and applying skills and promotes positive attitudes towards a healthy lifestyle. Thus we enable them to make informed choices about physical activity throughout their lives.

The aims of PE are:

To enable children to develop and explore physical skills with increasing control and co-ordination;

to encourage children to work and play with others in a range of group situations;

to develop the way children perform skills and apply rules and conventions for different activities;

to increase children’s ability to use what they have learnt to improve the quality and control of their performance;

to teach children to recognise and describe how their bodies feel during exercise;

to develop the children’s enjoyment of physical activity through creativity and imagination;

to develop an understanding in children of how to succeed in a range of physical activities and how to evaluate their own success;

to promote the raising of pupil’s self esteem at all times;

to raise the profile of the school within the local area and develop people’s confidence in it.

The Wider Curriculum

Educational visits to a variety of venues are used to enrich our curriculum. We also invite different groups and individuals – e.g. members of the local community, charity representatives, storytellers, artists, musicians and environmental groups – into school to talk to and work with the children.

Enrichment weeks, when the whole school works on a particular focus such as ‘Enterprise Week’ or ‘International Week’, take place each term.

The children have the opportunity to learn to play the guitar, brass instruments, woodwind, percussion or the keyboard/piano with peripatetic music teachers. Children in Key Stage 2 have weekly whole class ukulele sessions with Mr Blewitt and the school has a choir who perform in school and beyond such as concerts in local churches and alongside the Market Harborough Choral Society at their Christmas concert.

A variety of lunchtime and after school clubs are open to the children in different year groups. This year these include: hockey, cooking, healthy sports, maths, zumba, choir, netball, football, and dance.

We encourage the children actively to look after the school and wider environment, and have achieved the Eco Schools Green Flag Award. The outdoor curriculum and environmental education are a strong focus for us.

The school has a tradition of supporting charitable causes, encouraging the children to develop a sense of responsibility towards those less fortunate than themselves.